Lord Kidrodstock - Stays and gloves

I have hitherto omitted to state that this curious establishment had but one class. This fact did not prevent the pupils from pursuing their course of study in an otherwise normal manner, for each boy and girl was taken separately, even if only for a few minutes, in his lesson. Application and diligence did the rest. No one was idle, so genuine was the fear inspired by corset and whip.

Of the two latter incentives to good conduct, Miss Virginia had hitherto lived in ignorance, nor was it in keeping with the traditions of the establishment that Lady Flayskin should have introduced the girl to her classmates, without having previously obliged her to don the school uniform: white muslin dress with azure-blue silk sash, high-heeled, high-topped boots and the pitilessly tight corset which rob bed its wearer of the power to breathe in com fort. Clearly the directress meditated a plan.

The greatest attention was paid to the newcomer, by both the mistresses. Miss Virginia, in her rich silk frock, cut a very creditable figure among the pupils. Her waist, it is true, was not so small as theirs, but it was slender and her general bearing showed grace and health.

The directress mounted her high desk, and after a few more words in the same tone of affection to Miss Virginia, left the room.

The new girl's desk was situated near the gangway which, as I have already mentioned, divided the girls from the boys. Her seat was just facing my own, or rather, our two desks were separated from each other by the gangway.

Miss Virginia appeared at first to listen with attention to Mrs. Stuart's lecture upon the manners of good society, the necessity of men showing refinement both in their words and acts and acquiring such culture by carrefully training themselves and weighing the importance of trifles, together with the duty of women to show themselves correct in manner and pretty. This gave occasion for her to explain 110

the usefulness of the discipline of the corset and of high heels in breaking the unruly tem pers of children and giving them that dignity of bearing of which later they would be so gladly proud.

Mrs. Stuart discoursed at great length upon this favourite subject of which our ears grew weary in this dread college. The angular mistress's speeches were tiresome. She loved repetition and was an orator whose great power consisted in the ability to weary her hearers.

Miss Virginia had listened at first, but she soon took up a book and became absorbed in its pages, but not for long. She yawned nervously and, through making a sudden move ment, let drop the paper-knife she was holding. It fell near my owen desk.

Either because she thought it beneath her dignity to cross the gangway and pick up the object herself, or because she regarded me as an inferior; altough I do not think she suspected my sex, or for some other reason which I do not know, she looked at me and made the sound:

"Pst! Pst!"

I only paid more complete attention to the lecture of Mrs. Stuart, having no notion whatever of risking punishment in order to oblige the newcomer whose grand air I found insup portable.

She continued:

"Pst! Pst!"

With instinctive impatience, I shrugged my shoulders. Then without dropping her voice appreciably, she said to me:

"Here! You! Little girl! Pickup my paper knife."

I imprudently replied:

"Pick it up yourself! I am not your valet!"

"Valet?" said she in a tone of surprise. "You mean lady's maid?"

"I said what I meant to say. Leave me alone!"

And I tossed my head as I had had the habit of doing when still a boy and anxious to show my resolution in anything I decided to do.

Mrs. Stuart listened to this dialogue in a kind of stupor, for it was conducted almost in ordinary tones, forming an extraordinary inter112

ruption to the usual studious tranquillity of the class. Evidently she had heard every word, for Miss Virginia's tones were even more raised than my onw, and she was aware that it was the newcomer who had first broken the silence by her "Pst! Pst!" so annoying to listen to, but replied to by me first of all by a mere shrug of the shoulders, as I had only given a direct reply after being addressed directly and in a most insulting manner.

Mrs. Stuart was well aware of the circumstances, nor for the moment was she otherwise than impartial, for she merely turned to Mrs. Eagle who was standing by the wall keeping watch over our behaviour in a majestic manner,

"Kindly inform our gracious Lady Flayskin that her presence is requisite here," said Mrs. Stuart.

The directress entered the room a moment later.

I was confident of the juctice of my cause although greatly excited. My distress may therefore be imagined when I heard that 113

horrid old fishwife Mrs. Stuart, give the affair quite a different colouring.

From her maliciously concocted version it appeared that I was the chief culprit, and the directress was obliged even to gather from this fallacious account that I was the only guilty party

I was a young, loyal-hearted boy and at a complete loss to understand this feminine perfidy. It was clear that a victim was required. Unkind fate had designed me for the part. The unfortunate sitting part of my body was to pay the cost of Miss Virginia's first lesson.

As to the second lesson… But I will not anticipate.

"Alice!" said the directress. " Come here!"

My feeling of the injustice of this treatment was for me the strongest and uppermost feeling of my mind at that moment. Two months of discipline by means of chastisement and all these instruments of feminine toilet had not yet entirely extinguished my old instincts of rebellion. I was not yet sufficiently cowed. My fiery temperament gained the better of me and I cried out:

"In the first place my name is not Alice It is ridiculous so to call me. I am a boy, my name is Jimmy. As for that girl there… "

I pointed with a finger over my shoulder, indicating the newcomer without deigning to look at her.

"She need not show off her grand airs with me, for they lose their effect. I told her that I was not her valet and that was what I meant to tell her. Why do you say nothing to her? It is she who began."

Little stifled laughs in the class-room proved to me that I had won a triumph, of which, in point of fact, I had no great reason to be proud. None the less, I had my moment of pride. I was not wearing the leather collar, so I bent my head, thrusting forward my chin in the attitude dear to boxers. I think, (may heaven forgive me if I am mistaken!) that I even struck an attitude of pugilistic defence, or almost did so, for my courage did not permit me to complete the gesture. What I did was to clench my fists as much as my gloves permitted and to hold 115

out my bent elbow and forearm in front of any chest.

"Alice," repeated Lady Flayskin, "come here!"

My courage gave way on perceiving the con traction of her brows. I went forward in a state of pitiful fear, my hands up to my face, weeping hot tears, crying with anger in spite of my fear. I think I stumbled slightly by reason of my high heels.

"Go and find me the whip, Stella! The strongest of all! You know which I mean! That African whip ending in a piece of solid hippopotamus leather.

"You will find it in the second of the lowest drawers of my secretary. Here is the key!"

Pretty Stella, with a hateful smile, went swiftly to obey.

The directress then turned to me.

"Undress yourself!"

I cried and wept but took everything off, laying each garment upon my chair, until I only had on the hideous glazed kid combin ation which gave me the appearance of having a 116

negro's body and legs, so black and shiny looking was I.

Still bemoaning my fate, I went on my knees at the feet of the pitiless directress and with clasped hands entreated her to pardon me. She let me speak without showing the least sign either of pity or impatience. No hope could live in the face of this impassibility and I had a fit of sobbing, my grief knowing no bounds when I saw Stella appear bringing the hideous lash.